The Dawn and the Moon

The study smelled of old parchment, stained wood, & pipe smoke. Lord Edran Ainsel sat behind his ancient desk, its surface worn smooth by generations of hands that had signed treaties, condemned traitors, and helped pen the future of Goodhollow.

Before him lay a relic: a tattered flag, its edges scorched and frayed, the sunburst sigil of the Rising Dawn barely visible beneath soot and age.

The banner had been passed down through blood and silence, folded and locked away until this morning, when Edran had found it in the bottom drawer of his father’s cabinet. Now it lay unfurled, whispering stories in the flickering candlelight.

Edran’s eyes drifted, not to the flag, but through it into memory.

The Rising Dawn battalion had marched into the Goodhollow Valley when it was still wild and cruel. His great-great-grandfather, Commander Alric Ainsel, had led them beneath a sky veiled in mist, where the trees whispered secrets and the shadows moved with purpose. Time and time again, they pushed back the darkness, building a valley of promise safe in their actions.

The Lunar Knight had ruled there then. A creature of moonlight and malice, cloaked in silver and sorrow. His band of Shadow Fey struck from the gloom, blades like crescent moons, eyes like dying stars. While the Lunar Knight lied, Goodhollow could not. And so, it had come to this.

The battle had lasted three days.

On the first, overconfident and eager, the Rising Dawn lost their scouts. On the second, blood fired for revenge, their healers. On the third, knowing there was no path but through, they lost their leader, Alric, and nearly everything else.

But they won. The Knight was banished, sealed in his Ivory Tower beyond the Veil, his name forbidden in song. Cradlebrook was built atop the ashes, a city of light and law.

And yet… Edran could still hear the stories whispered by his grandmother to him as a child: how the moon, and the ground, had turned red that night with blood. How the shadows had screamed in joy when Alric fell, and how the light of dawn wrested victory from dark defeat. How the survivors refused to speak of what they saw in those final hours as the moon in the sky and the Lunar Knight on the ground were both banished from the land. 

Victory was had. The Lunar Knight Banished. But every night, the moon itself returns... And so, too, might the Lunar Knight.

A knock at the door.

Edran blinked. The candle had burned low.

“Lord Ainsel,” came the voice of his steward. “The Council awaits.”

Edran rose slowly, his hand brushing the edge of the flag with reverence, pride, and a nagging hint of worry.

Goodhollow tended to forget its heroes, victims to their deadliest foe, time. 

But it was in forgetting their enemies that Goodhollow's fate could fall.

He paused, then folded the Dawn Flag carefully, placing it in the drawer once more.

As he turned to leave, he glanced at the window. The moon hung low and full. Silver, silent, watching.